Sorry for that. I thought you was talking on irc about 4 maps 400x400.

And here is third version of my map:
- No square anymore
- Added Small Island (Jaxad's idea)
- Reshaped academy for sake Rotonen's likeness ;)
- Added Vortex area - may be useful for backstory or quest - And we could remove it as fast as we added. Particle Engine should handle it.
- Green semi-transparent circles are map change spots
- Added isolated island - area of general quest purpose - accessible via underwater tunnel
- Added old crater - just another place for mobs
- Added new easy to map part of island. And we got swamp there!
- Underground tunnel will be a bit more complicated

Additional parts of island may be unlock when necessary.

Tutorial_Island_Layout_Map_3.png (67.39 KiB) Viewed 2619 times

PNG is in indexed color mode - because of attachments size limitation on forums.

i wrote:And here is third version of my map:
- No square anymore
- Added Small Island (Jaxad's idea)
- Reshaped academy for sake Rotonen's likeness
- Added Vortex area - may be useful for backstory or quest - And we could remove it as fast as we added. Particle Engine should handle it.
- Green semi-transparent circles are map change spots
- Added isolated island - area of general quest purpose - accessible via underwater tunnel
- Added old crater - just another place for mobs
- Added new easy to map part of island. And we got swamp there!
- Underground tunnel will be a bit more complicated

Additional parts of island may be unlock when necessary.

(snip image)

PNG is in indexed color mode - because of attachments size limitation on forums.

This allows us to make smaller maps (if only slightly in some cases) and allows us to spread out their creation better. It also fixes some oddities and allows the academy interior to be it's own map (and not include the area right outside the gates; or alternatively, not have such a small map right outside the gates. This has ten outdoor maps:

Academy

Grassland south of academy

Village and surrounding

Woods

Sunken ship cove

Secret island

Lagoon

Old crater

Southern part (with swamp)

Island of "Saint Jaxad"

Only the first three need to be mapped for CR1. We can add more in later CRs with higher-level content. The other maps are easily and reasonably blocked off.

Nice progress indeed, and what I really like we are really starting to plan before doing and that's good.
My only concern is we're concentrating lots of ideas on a settlement which should be quite simple (don't misunderstand me, I don't mean to remove details).
In my opinion there are so many special spots, even too much if the island is intended to be left as soon as you're ready. If you can come back as well the island will only contain low level missions to avoid scaring newbies.
Also a lot of players tend to skip tutorials and go directly into the "real" world.

If you promise me we will have this kind of detail on every new map, then please go on, yell at me and ignore what I'm saying.
However I don't want to see each island map with a sunken ship, a swamp, a star observatory, a lagoon, a crater, a small island, a vortex, an underwater tunnel, and so on...

I'd prefer setting things down instead of adding further detail each map revision.

<sob><sob> But this is our first island.... It has to be special ~ for long time (until CR2) it will be only island in game XD
On eAthena server we have many inactive caves, the same situation will be here. Those are just random ideas, and we should pick up the best ones. Other may be postponed until we figure out that would be nice to diversify a bit tutorial island. We can also gave a random "final quest" to player before he leaves the academy.

From tech point of view Jaxad's map splitting looks fine. Now I will concentrate on academy design and missed tilesets (yes I'm going to finish Block Walls).

The swamp peninsula came out of nowhere, requires additional tileset work and seems to add length and explorability to a simple island. If need be, we could add it later, IMO.

The northwestern island comes out of Monkey Island two, but is missing the waterfall to be turned off. Yet again a nice idea, but we have to give the axe to some stuff so we can actually get stuff done.

I'd also be willing to combine the sunken ship to the lagoon.

On the island of Jax or the old crater I'm undecided since I don't know how they'll tie in and what they are for.

The academy, the dungeon beneath and the village are already going to be a lot of content for a simple "learn to play and leave" type of an area.

IMHO, the NPC content can be changed for players who come back, using quest variables.

Access to some map parts can be also restricted using switch/door NPC.

The remaining common part in the tutorial island would then be common only for the maps shape, and for the monsters.

Also, why not unlock access to new parts of the island only for players who have done some external quests in the outer world. Wouldn't it be more appealing for them to come back later on the island?
Just a thought.

Bertram wrote:Access to some map parts can be also restricted using switch/door NPC.

TMWServ also allows "smart warps" in form of trigger areas. Trigger areas are map areas which execute script code when a being steps into them. This allows almost any form of conditional warp which comes to mind.

A possible explanation could be that the university professor created magical barriers at the entrances of all dangerous areas on the island to protect the inexperienced students form the monsters which live in there.

former Manasource Programmer

former TMW Pixel artist

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